The Eye is proud to announce its editorial team for the 2013-14 academic year. Beginning in the Fall, Emma Kemp and Shana Mirambeau, two Critical Studies MFA students heading into their second year at CalArts, will lead the Eye into its future. We could not be more excited! It has been a pleasure working with all of our contributors over the past two years. Now, with heavy hearts and the highest of hopes, we leave it to them and to you to take up the Eye and make it all that you want it to be.

Thank you for everything,

Bel & LKV

Push up the fader
Bust the meter
Shake the tweeter

-Erykah Badu

Hello!

There are so many ways we thought of introducing ourselves, but in the end, we chose to be true to our nature: simple, honest, a little lost at times, but whole-heartedly invested in exploring the labyrinth of passion within our souls. As editors, writers, artists, and thinkers, we intend to honor the variegated talents that weave the fibers of this unique community.

We are not here to make a Kumbaya speech. We too get frustrated by the lack of time and space to truly share in the offerings of each other’s métiers. As we sat writing this letter, we asked ourselves what, in fact, are the real barriers preventing us from collaboration and exposure to one another?

With thumping clarity, we realized the biggest blockade is probably our ferocious dedication to personal practice (a characteristic of all art makers!) closely followed by the physical separation of the spaces we occupy. It’s definitely not easy—it takes a lot, running around from show to reading to performance and everything in between—to sample the vibrant multiplicity of CalArts.

We intend to continue developing this publication as a true interdisciplinary space to collectively talk about and share our work with each other. It’s time to jump in and mix it up! We want this paper to be an open, inter-connective magnetic field, providing each student with the potential to engage with it as a form of cultural and political participation. It is our goal to keep up with the forward creative steps of our brilliant CalArtians! We encourage rigorous investigation and exploration. The Eye is a space to seek, stage, and perceive an alternative set of questions and responses.

There are many exciting ideas on the table which we can’t wait to implement, including a pointed commitment to showcasing multimedia student work from across the school, a renewed online presence, and several new content features! If you have any suggestions regarding things you’d like to see in the paper, shoot us an email! If you want to head anything up, we are keen to include as many voices as possible.

CalArts IS a COMMUNITY; LET’S MAKE IT WORK FOR US!

The Eye is already a conducting force, melding, shaping, and honing our creativity. We want to make it easy and more accessible to converse, explore, and expose what we discover with and through each other. The Eye is a rare space, which makes such communication possible. It’s for YOU, by you, and through you, we can instill a new sense of collectivity to ignite this CalArts Community!

As Bel and LKV move forward into the next phases of their lives, we would like to thank them for creating such a thought-provoking creative platform. We are ready to step up and rise to the challenges and jubilations of creating space for so many remarkable voices here at CalArts. Join us as we enhance the spirit of our community and continue to nourish a place where a multitude of perspectives are represented, exchanged, debated, and valued.

We look forward to a flood of submissions in September, RIGHT?!

Until the sun sets east,
Shana Mirambeau and Emma Kemp.

“Adrien Brody: such a generous lover.”

“You’re supposed to be a rock star, not an artist!”

“I feel like I’m on drugs. And I’m not.”
“Are you sure? You’re at CalArts, it could be a contact high.”

“This mic stand has performance anxiety.”

“This is why dogs shouldn’t drive cars.”

“Someone brought a goat to the farmer’s market, and they were being super pretentious about it.”

“How sad if you met some really cute boy but at graduation?”

“You have quite the impact on my corporeality.”

“YOU… are just a signifier.”

“One night—how many kazoos?”

Credit: Matias Viegener

The visitor from across the northern border has been seen harassing students and dogs around campus. Whatever this hoodlum does, don’t make eye contact, offer help, nor present any food—it’s best not to negotiate with terrorists.

Dela

4 years old
Husky/Border Collie mix

Credit: Natalie Hon

What would Dela say if she could talk: “What upppp?!” because if she’s at the top of the stairs and higher than you, she lifts up her paw to give high fives.

Dela, short for De la Luna, is most recognizable around campus for her beautiful shaggy coat and loyalty to her human, Alex Emami a BFA-4 in Music. But her luscious locks (two coats to be precise—an under coat and an over coat) is both a blessing and a curse. Built for cold weather, Dela despises the Southern California heat. As a result, her favorite pastime is drinking all the water she can get her paws on.

Described as solitary and pensive but full of love, Dela is also quite the sneaky pup. When asked what kind of human she’d be, Alex didn’t hesitate: “She’d be a Siberian daughter of some big drug cartel member who went to train in Ninjutsu for the majority of her life and sticks to the shadows.”

Well shit, that’s one cool dog.

General

3 ½ months old
Bull Terrier/Blue Pit mix

Credit: Natalie Hon

You don’t have to go far to see a real life miracle. General, the rescued pup belonging to Giacomo Veronese, a BFA-2 in Photography & Media, and Nicole Sullivan, a BFA-3 in Theater, is a survivor of epic proportions.

While on a trip to the desert, Giacomo met a woman who’d found General in the desert—his legs were malformed, and he could barely walk. Not knowing what to do with him, the woman was going to take him to a nearby shelter. Giacomo offered to take the puppy instead, and it’s been a cuddle fest ever since.

With proper nutrition and a lot of love from his adoptive parents, General’s legs healed without surgery, and he is now the model of health. But don’t be fooled by his lolling runs around campus: this young pup has an old soul. Take a look into his eyes (one blue, one green) and tell him your sorrows—you won’t regret it.

By: Gabriela Garcia Medina

Illustrator: Yon Hui Lee

I was raised on a thrifty budget. When we’d shop at a store for something that was brand new, I could only choose from the clearance rack, and most times we’d go to Little India in London for all my birthday dresses—I used to look like a Hindi Cuban, but my mother didn’t care; dresses in Little India were cheap and negotiable.

I was ashamed to wear the hand-me-downs from my older cousins. Even though I went to a really poor public school, everyone else always seemed to have cooler stuff than me. I remember Katie Bowman in my seventh grade class wore all the cool, new outfits from C&A, and I used to wish her mom would kidnap me and take me on a shopping spree, but that never happened.

Ironically, when I came into my own money as an adult and could have indulged in new fashions to erase the shame of years of financial hardship, I instead took advantage of the skills my mother taught me. To this day I buy most of my clothes at thrift stores, flea markets, and vintage shops, and I will rigorously inspect garments for tears, tarnishes, stains, rips, broken zippers, and then use all of that information as bargaining chips in pleading my case for a lower price. So here are a few of my frugal shopping tips, to keep you well dressed and in the black.

There are lots of “Vintage” shops out there, how do you know which are the GOOD ones?

Smell: Notice how the store smells. Smell is a good indicator of how much the shop owner cares about their inventory. Really passionate sellers LOVE the garments so much, they wash, steam, and press them so that when you walk in, it smells clean and fresh. If the store smells like someone’s dirty yoga pants after a Bikram class, that’s the first sign for you to tread lightly, touch carefully, and try on ONLY if you must! And be sure to wash your hands after you leave a smelly shop.

Sight: Read the labels. Legitimate vintage shops will have garments with authentic old labels, worn out, washed out, and fading (though some won’t have any tags at all). This is a good sign. However, some stores will try to pass off low-quality vintage knockoffs (from stores like H&M or Forever 21) as the real thing by removing the tags. So if you see cut out tags, proceed with caution. You can tell quality from shit by examining the inseams and stitching. Look for items with straight, sturdy, reinforced seams. A store that takes pride in their items will also often mend broken zippers, holes, tears, etc; look out for these features, too, and note any damage. It is ok to pay $40 for a piece that has been dry-cleaned/steamed, mended, and cared for, but don’t pay $40 for a smelly H&M dress you could have gotten for $10 on clearance two seasons ago, or shorts you’ll have to spend $30 mending!

Touch: After the store has passed the smell and sight test, make sure you touch the garments. Close your eyes. Does it feel nice? You want to put these clothes on your body—they should feel good! But if you ABSOLUTELY must have that polyester dress, then remember not to pay more than the fabric is worth, which is…not very much!

Try it ON: So, your garment passed all the above qualifications! Now it’s time to try it on. Even if it looks a bit too big or too small, don’t trust the sizing, which changes over time. If you think it might fit, but it’s the wrong size, TRY IT ON ANYWAY! You may be pleasantly surprised. And remember, if an item is really special but is a little big, or a little long, you can always take it to a tailor; just factor the added expense into the total cost, and it may still be cheaper than buying a new dress. Plus, yours will be ONE of a kind and fitted to your measurements! But if the garment is made of cheap fabric, it may not be alterable, could fray or even fall apart, or cost more to fix than the garment may actually be worth, so make sure it passes the smell, sight, and touch tests first!

Leave It Alone: Part of being a thrifty shopper is making good decisions. OK, sometimes when you find something you love, you have to have it right there and then. But MOST of the time, even if you really like an item (and especially if it will need alterations), you want to try it on, leave the store, and think about it for a day or two. You can ask an employee to hold it for you, but if they won’t hold it, then leave it to chance. It’s kind of like gambling with the Universe. Vintage buying can be very impulsive, because it deals in unique items. But remember that the person selling it is just as lucky to get rid of it as you would be to own it (if not more!). Which brings me to my last tip:

NEGOTIATE: To you, it may be the dress of a lifetime, one you can see yourself wearing while walking through Paris in faux fur and Jackie O sunglasses, but the store’s employee don’t know this. Play down your interest. Tell them you’d like a few days to think about it. If they don’t want to hold it, ask for a discount there and then. If they refuse, walk away. If the piece is meant for you, it will be there when you come back. Vintage Shops aren’t like regular shops; once you buy it, you OWN it and there are usually no refunds, returns, or exchanges, so waiting two days is a good way to be sure it’s worth it, plus it gives the store owner an incentive to offer you a discount or some sort of deal if it’s still there when you come back. Many times, you will forgot all about it and change your mind. When this happens, as a courtesy I call the store and tell them to take the item off hold. In the end, you have to decide what the item is worth.

Gabi is an MFA-1 inter-school student of Theater and Writing. She does not like writing bios because no one reads them anyway! She writes, “If there’s something you wanna know, buy me a coffee and we’ll talk!”

dear Sisco,

i only learned of your nickname after your death. everyone knew but me. my mom never told me! Grandma never told me! my half-sister or half-brothers never told me! what is your favorite color? blue? i asked my half-sister Angie. she said she thinks it is blue too!

i’m in a dream. i finally go visit you at your house. for some reason you are drunk… so much so that we can’t communicate. when i talk you can’t hear me. in this dream it is always nighttime – washed in a lazy, purple flannel sky with dark denim blue clouds. it’s like the sky is drunk too. my body soaks this in and i am happy. i tell the family it is okay, i understand, i will take a taxi to the airport and i am not mad. i hug you, you disintegrate. you tell me how much you care for me as you are disappearing.

your son, my half-brother, Luke, said that at your machine repair shop there were stray cats. the stray cats had a litter of kittens. they were underneath the truck sleeping in a huddle to keep warm. you did not know they were there and started the engine and ran over them, killing them all. Luke said this hurt you pretty bad and you were upset for a long time.

and that you went to buy sour cream on thanksgiving. when you saw a bum on the road and you went grocery shopping for him and bought him a basket full of groceries. when you got home you realized you forgot all about the sour cream at the store.

your son. my half-brother, Travis, said that you and your neighbor didn’t get along and he was always nagging you about… i don’t remember but when you were talking to Travis, the neighbor came up to complain to you, you grabbed him by the neck and choked him till he turned another color. all the while swearing in italian. Travis said he never bothered you again.

i try to remember you. thick black curly hair, black curly mustache like one of the mario brothers in nintendo games. i can’t see your eyes, eyes. eyes? i go to a photograph for reference. i have to hold on to what your eyes looked like.

i see your brown eyes smiling in the photograph. they were symmetrical and big. Travis said your grade school picture looks like me. you have a mischievous grin, with finite features. olive skin, and a skinny neck. you look like after your picture was taken you took off running to your fort to blow things up like tires or refrigerators.

your bother, my uncle, Pancho, said you both used to play with dynamite when you were children.

dear Dad,

i have your guitar in my room – cold and slick as ever, silently humming songs to be played. your dusty books sit on my book shelf and wait for me to read them. the dead flowers i found in your bible hang their heads down in exhaustion, they have laid down, and curled up on the table, relieved to relax.

your sister, my aunt Sheila sent me some pictures. the sun in this picture looks like it bleached the photograph to yellows, browns and orange. one picture looks like you were standing in front of a house. you are holding me up to take the picture. i was about two years old and that was probably the only time i was around as chubby as you were. you look like you were laughing. i have this blank look on my face like i did not know what was going on.

the next picture looks like that same day. it is just a picture of me sitting up in what looks like a gray, concrete driveway. i am sitting next to a black tire that is bigger than i am. the rest of the truck is cut out of the picture. The red truck covers me in shade as i look at the camera.

another picture is a family picture during christmas. i am smiling next to the big family of you and my uncles, aunts, grandparents, cousins, step-mother and sister. i have a big smile on my face. i don’t remember these times or pictures. but this is evidence that i was there. it was real. it is real. you were real. you are.

Shishonia is an MFA-1 in Writing.

At what point in human history did woman and her female nude divert themselves from one another? From the meso-era to the neo-renaissance, the image of the female nude was not only celebrated, it was admired. There was a certain reverence the female nude evoked; a certain divine power. The look of the female nude was proof that god, in whatever form, was a power within. These notions of the female and her nude have metamorphosed themselves, in our contemporary culture.

As we embark on our journey to discover the truth behind the female and her nude, we reunite the two.

-BCQ

***

What is exploitation of the nude human body and when does it come into play? I believe as artists we come across this question every day, and we have to ask ourselves if whatever it is we are dealing with is exploitation of our beliefs or art. It is a fine line that artists such as you or I walk repeatedly throughout our lives and careers, deciding for ourselves the answer. It is a vital question and demands answering, because it affects our work as artists and the world that we live in as humans.

Illustrator: Yon Hui Lee

The purpose for this project is creating questions through the art of comparison and opinion. I have come together with Anna in order to gather various artists to join in comparing the nudes of history. We want to gather different opinions and perspectives on the topic of the human nude, because there is so much to be said.

We want artists to come together to create a team that researches and uncovers the intention behind the human body in dance, literature, photography, film, music, theater, media and many other art forms, which can then be compared, contrasted, and interrogated. Which forms stand by the idea that “sex sells” and which forms don’t?

We can let the public decide, as we uncover nude forms that are the same and yet so different. All of the research for Naked Truths will be presented in a gallery opening that showcases the research, art, and performances inspired by this project.

Be a part of uncovering the different meanings of the human nude, and let your opinions be voiced and heard.

After receiving her BFA in Dance from CalArts, Bianca Stephanie Mendoza moved to the San Francisco bay area where she founded dance company Binki Danz, now performing and creating new work across Northern CA.

***

A series of questions to consider from Anna U. Giordano:

• Why do you think what you think?
• Why do you do what you do?
• How and how much are thought and action connected?
• What does it mean to “control” the body?
• Be & Appear: where are the limits?
• How are stereotypes and myths constructed? And would humans be able to live without them?
• How much influence do the media and education have in our relationship  with ourselves?

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

Be a part of this project by writing for the Naked Truths Blog at nakedtruthsproject.com. All you have to do is write an opinion coming from you about the female nude. (It can be about anything pertaining the female nude subject.) Anyone can enter a post, and several CalArtians already are!

Send your final draft to info.nakedtruths@gmail.com with a mini bio and any photos that you would like to share. Our team will publish it on the Naked Truths blog. Thank you!

-NT

I have given you everything
My plans and myself,
My muted song
Through the echoing underpass,
My money and my want
And my sins
All seven
And I emptied my heart
Till nostalgia and pursuit
Lied passive on the pavement.
In invisible picture books
I recorded you
You age like wine.

Hey everyone,

I don’t want to jerk you guys around, so I’m gonna get straight to the point: I’ve been liberated.

Yeah, you heard right. I’m no longer attached to Ma anymore. I was part of some groundbreaking surgery thing where they separated us. I don’t really remember too much of the details, but something like blah blah conjoined blah blah sharing major organs blah blah an 18-hour operation required blah if successful, you’ll be given high doses of pain medication to aid in the healing process.

So I figured, if they fail, I’ll either wake up and still be attached to my Ma (nothing new there) or never wake up and float off to the dark beyond. Or  I’d wake up finally able to sleep on my side without a grown-ass human attached to my back, with my very own morphine drip. (Yeah, they promised I’d get one all to myself, even though I’m essentially an infant. Seemed like an ethically sound decision to me, too.)

Since then, it’s been one big morphine hallucination and press tour blur. Being hugged is a real weird sensation. And I’ll be honest—sometimes when I wanna nap, I ask Ma to sleep behind me just for old time’s sake.

Sorry I didn’t let you bastards know where I was. But I figured now was better than never. Even if this is my letter of resignation. Oh shit, I forgot to mention that.

I’m resigning.

Which should be fine since you fucknuts don’t pay me anyway. You should be happy all I’m doing is resigning and not suing your asses for illegal child labor or something.

I’m actually trying to work on that: my anger problems. Barbara has really been helping me to tap into my Zen candy center. Yeah, she stayed with me through it all. What can I say? She’s the whisky that goes with my steak.

There’s a lot of logistics to deal with, too. Like changing my name. Now that I’ve been separated from Ma, the name BabyTumorFace just doesn’t seem to fit me anymore. I like the sound of Ronald.

I want to go and start my life all new. Like the smiling, bright-eyed baby I never got to be. Ma, Barbara, and I are thinking of moving to Hawaii or somewhere relaxing, where Ma and I can continue our recovery. She’s missing a lot of flesh now that I’ve been carved out of her. But I’ve never seen her happier. Well, I’ve never actually seen her from such a straight-on angle, which is pretty damn great. No more conversations in the mirror. I don’t know if it’s just the angle, but she seems to be smiling a lot more now. Me too.

Thanks for all of the kinda good times. I made one of those Edible Arrangement shit things for the Eye. But instead of that froofy chocolate and fruit crap, I stuck a bunch of raw meat on sticks so you guys can barbecue it up when you got time.  You’re welcome.

Now I’m feelin’ all nostalgic. OK, before I officially leave, I wanna give one last piece of advice to the kids: if you ever have a chance to be part of any medical experiments, go for it.

Catch you on the flipside, motherfuckers,

Ronald

Think about personalizing this form letter and sending it out…

Dear (insert CalArts Executive Officer or School Dean),

I would like to know what you are doing to help our institution divest from fossil fuel stock. The continued release of carbon into the atmosphere directly threatens my current health and my future quality of life. I find it appalling that we are financially supporting that crime.

If you would like to learn more, please visit gofossilfree.org.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

(name, year, and contact information)

P.S. Have you seen ‘Do the Math – The Movie’ yet? It’s for free on the YouTube!